So yeah, she's a robot. I swear.

If Sari's a robot, I'll eat my keyboard

If Sari's a robot, I'll eat two keyboards!

If Sari's a robot, I'll Powerglide your mom!

Oh, wait, I already did.

okay, now that we've gotten the INH out of our systems...

I've avoided saying "she isn't a robot" or "she won't be a robot" because the writers can do whatever they please, regardless of what I think. But I do think it is highly unlikely, for a number of reasons.

[Christopher Walken mode]
If Sari's a robot, I'll come to your house...and eat YOUR keyboard.
[/Christopher Walken mode]

(Obscure, mid-90's SNL reference)

Hmmmmm. Well, where's her mom? Not saying Spike had one.

spike was a robot too!

But he got better...

and then he did it again

CEREBROS'D!

wow, never even thought about that.

'D

while a few weeks ago i would have totally agreed now i dunno i know i dont want her to be a robot

Sari is Blackarachnia!!! No, that's impossible. But it would be kind of unique if she discovered she was a robot then used the allspark key on herself to make herself into a transformer. But what would that do for her relationship with Bumblebee...

HAWT

they might spark a deeper relationship.............



















































...who said robots couldnt have relationships shame on you !!

She's adopted.

ORLY? She looks like she could be his daughter.

No, rly, her character bio in a press release said she's his adopted daughter.

OIC

Prof. Sumdac, as a lifetime techno geek, and unable to hit a date with girls on college, so he eventually bio-engineered Sari to be his daughter.

Seems a bit to convenient, the whole adopting a kid and then sheltering her while you barely pay attention to anything she does until she's attacked by a giant ro-beast. Sees a lot like something you'd do with an experiement that maybe got a little out of hand one day and you had to cover up for. Doctor Sumdac is pretty good at keeping secrets yah know. Also, Megatron is her mommy, and that's funny too.

Or maybe he just likes his robots, and thinks they'd do a better job of educating her than the public schools. (It is Detroit, after all.)

Fact is, she's 1000000000000000000000x more intelligent than anything Sumdac ever built, and Cybertronian technology requires a spark for sentient life. Which she could not have.

I agree. She's TOTALLY not a robot. I don't know why people come up with really whack conspiracies like this.

well obviously she has half of megatron's spark in her. The other half Sumdac keeps in a squishy box for when Megatron gets out of line.

Yeah, adopted from the ROBOT FACTORY!!!!

Okay, I've changed my vote. She's totally a robot.

All I've seen is circumstantial evidence to support this theory... how about something substantive?

From what we've seen of the writing quality so far, it has just enough inconsistency that if Sari turned out to be a robot, it wouldn't be all that out of place. Besides, the writers never even clarified what exactly a spark is and role it plays in the cybertronian life cycle.

her interactions with alspark confirm she isnt normal, but I would say robot, besides, arent there some asimov laws about self awareness of robots


I realize they dont have to apply, I just like to sound smart on the internets

The Allspark is an allpowerful(Yes, spelled this way) mystical artifact thingy(Spelled this way too). It can do whatever it wants.

Akin to a bear Blotting in the woods.

Maybe you should pay attention then, because in the first episode Prime died when his spark was extinguished. That's the role it plays. There is no Cybertronian life without sparks.

Sumdac's robots are based on Cybertronian technology.

Therefore, Sumdac is incapable of creating sentient life without Cybertronian sparks.

Why don't they teach logic in these schools... [/old dude from Narnia books]

P.S. we can't draw any conclusions about Sari & the Allspark because she is the only human who has come in contact with it.

FINE *walks off in a huff*

actually hadnt even taken that into consideration, and since she has no human contact except her dad (a nutty professor type) he wouldnt notice anything odd anyway

That's my point, your logical reasoning is a little too highbrow for Animated's level of maturity. Yes, turning Sari into a robot would not be completely reasonable, but that particular plot element wouldn't be so absurd that it couldn't fit in with the overall quality of the cartoon's writing.

You seem to hold a low opinion of the show's writing. I don't know why you do, but in my opinion "Animated" is quite well-written. And I should point out that your argument is a cop-out. Of course it *could* happen -- I've said as much. The writers can do whatever they want. What I'm getting at is what is more likely to be true.

Not necessarily. It depends on where you group the cartoon. As a cartoon aimed at 5 year olds, it's very good and even above average. However, the writing might feel a bit dumbed down to the 7-and-up crowd. When you take that into account, it would be relatively easy for the writers to make Sari into a robot without confusing the target demographic.

My nine-year-old son thinks Animated is the best-written TF show ever. FWIW

I'm not buying. At all....just to put that out there. It seems like a huge stretch to make this work. That is all.I have to hear this. Please elaborate on these inconsistencies you speak of.

Again, the show is aimed at five year olds. Five year olds wouldn't perceive that plot element as such a big stretch. Yeah, older kids would but they're not the primary target demographic.

So you're admitting that the idea makes no sense, basically.

In the context of the cartoon, it makes about as much sense as Bumblebee entering a wrestling competition and fighting a little troll-looking guy who's able to grow even bigger than him with the help of electrically-stimulated steroids. It also makes about as much sense as Megatron having Dr. Sumdac convert a bunch of mechanical dinosaurs into super soldiers and use them to attack the Autobots.

In short, the idea may not make any sense but sometimes, the cartoon itself doesn't make any sense.

You don't understand. I'm talking about the internal logic of the show.

TV shows can make whatever rules they want. What they can't do is violate their own rules. It's been established in "Animated" that Cybertronians cannot live without sparks. It's also been established that Sumdac's robots are based on that same Cybertronian technology. Therefore, for Sumdac to build a living, sentient, conscious robot, he would need to have a spark to place within that robot. And indeed, every indication thus far is that Sumdac was only ever able to build witless drones who can be easily fooled (as we saw demonstrated again today in "Nanosec").

These are the rules of the show. In order to claim that Sari is a robot, you have to account for these facts.

I think your logic is somewhat flawed, Pete.

1. Transformers need Sparks to be alive.
2. ?
3. Sumdac's robots can't have any degree of A.I. or self awareness without Sparks.
4. Profit.

Life and consciousness are different things.

FWIW, I'm sort of 50/50 on the idea of Sari being a robot right now, meaning I don't think either situation is more likely than the other.

Considering the general acceptance of robots in future Detroit, I don't think Dr. Sumdac would keep it a secret from Sari if she was a robot, considering how little she interacts with other humans in the first place.

I didn't want to start a semantic debate about consciousness vs. sentience vs. "life", so I was just using words that would hopefully give you the general idea of what I meant. Clearly there is a vast difference between Sari and her teacher-bot. That's what I was trying to get at. Whatever word we want to use to explain that difference is fine with me.

But to address your point, #2 should be filled in with what I said in my quoted post:

It is increasingly evident that Sumdac really doesn't know what he's doing. He just got very, very lucky when he found Megatron's head in his back yard. If you want to claim that Sumdac is capable of creating sentient AI apart from his copying of Cybertronian technology, then you would need to back that up with evidence of his abilities. And you would also need to realize that such a claim would undermine a central premise of the show. Namely, that the technological advances in future Detroit are all made possible because of Sumdac's serendipitous discovery 50 years ago. You'll notice that he has no competitors. (His only known rival to date used biotechnology and was specifically opposed to machine technology.)

I think it's more a case of him over-analyzing things. Pete is latching on to every little plot point without taking into consideration that this is a kids' cartoon, so those plot points aren't going to be 100% consistent from episode to episode. Granted, I doubt it will get to the point where we have seriously conflicting origin stories for the Constructicons, but I also doubt that turning Sari into a robot would be such a big inconsistency that the cartoon's target demographic, five year olds, would become too confused to keep watching it.

As for why Sumdac doesn't reveal Sari to the world, it's probably because he doesn't want her to know that she's a robot so he can raise her as his own daughter. Sumdac probably built her because he was lonely.

No way. I was also entertaining the idea until Big Daddy made a very valid point.

If Sumdac was able to build sentient, intelligent robots, he would have no need of Megatron's further assistance whatsoever in building bots. The episode with the dimwitted Dinobots proves that Sumdac, or even Megatron for that matter, doesn't have that ability yet. Also, why would the AllSpark need to imbue Sari's key with energy if she was a machine. Much like the movie AllSpark, the Animated one seems to be something of a mystery to the cybertronians as well.

People keep saying that all of Sumdac's robots are based on cybertronian technology. Sure, I can see where he would get inspiration, but they can't be THAT cybertronian if the Autobots haven't noticed or asked any questions yet.

Hey no fair I called this shenanigan more than 3 weeks ago when I saw the first episode. I mean what kind of dad lets her daughter roam around with giant robots.

Again, the target demographic doesn't have the discernment required to notice those little inconsistencies, nor are those little inconsistencies meant to be relevant to the plot. The fact is, the Dinobots are dimwitted because that's how they were in G1. It has nothing to do with whether or not Sumdac is able to create a smart robot.